Some day, many years from now, Alina Roise and Maxim Sardikov will perhaps look back at their petition to the High Court of Justice against the Chief Rabbinate and marriage registrars in four cities as a turning point.

But when they agreed a few months ago to join a petition by ITIM - The Jewish Life Information Center (which provides advice in conversion and other religious matters ) against four municipal rabbis who refuse to allow converts to marry, and against the Chief Rabbinate, which chose not to take any action against the rabbis, the couple was motivated to act simply because of a sense of injustice.

The Interior Ministry and Jewish Agency must reconsider their decision not to allow Dale Streisand, a cousin of American singer Barbra Streisand, to immigrate to Israel, MK Ilan Ghilon (Meretz ) demanded over the weekend.

Nicky Maor, director of the immigrant assistance center for the Reform Jewish movement in Israel, said aliyah applications are being dealt with more rigorously out of concern that the Law of Return is being exploited by missionaries, particularly from the United States.

She mentioned that this is not the first time Internet has been used in these more -rigorous background checks.

Anat Zuria has made her career exploring the stories of religious women on the margins of their world. Her latest work, The Black Bus, a selection at the recent New York Jewish Film Festival, is no exception.

...In interviews, Zuria has said that she made this movie to give Haredi women a voice. To tell the stories that are overshadowed by the men who traditionally speak for them.

When Yaakov Epstein became Chief Rabbi of Haifa in 2052, neither the press nor the public took special notice.

True, he was the first Reform rabbi elected to the highest rabbinical position in a major metropolis, but he had already served as Chief Rabbi of Netanya. In fact, six Conservative and four Reform rabbis were then serving as Chief Rabbis of medium-sized Israeli cities.

Dr. Arye Carmon is president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a think tank based in Jerusalem. Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer and Prof. Yedidia Z. Stern are IDI’s vice presidents of research.

The haredi rabbinate has radicalized its positions on issues of religion and state. One example is its attitudes toward the national judicial system; important rabbis have ruled that anyone who turns to state courts “has no portion in the world to come.”

The rabbinate has also hardened its control over conversions, attempting to disqualify retroactively the conversions of thousands within the army or other frameworks.

...The Zionist center – religious and secular alike – must take responsibility for the Jewish character of the state, and not leave this task in the hands of radicals.

What Israel most desperately needs is complete separation between religion and the state.

The government must not be allowed to pass any law privileging one religion over another, or privileging religion over non-religion.

Tax money should not be used to support religious institutions. The government must not be in the business of determining a person’s religion or adjudicating religious questions. Such actions are inherently discriminatory, and they are the source of many of our never-ending political problems.

We are concerned that the office of the Chief Rabbinate has become politicized and appears directed toward enforcing political positions endorsed by ultra-Orthodox political parties within the context of Israeli coalition politics.

In recent months otherwise well-intentioned efforts to facilitate conversion to Judaism have been linked for political reasons with efforts to expand the power of the Chief Rabbinate to determine who qualifies as a convert.

Its monopoly on issues affecting the actual status of Jews not only within Israel but also of those seeking to immigrate to Israel damages both the unity of the Jewish people internationally and risks the alienation of American Jewry from the Jewish state.

The State of Israel began with a 'religious status quo' agreement balancing the demands of secular Zionists with Orthodox religious requirements.

Fifty years later, a changing demographic and widening gap between Orthodox and secular Israelis have led to a national identity crisis and public protests over attempts to redefine the character of the State.

Dr. Adam S. Ferziger is senior lecturer, Gwendolyn and Joseph Straus Fellow, and vice chairman of the Graduate Program in Contemporary Jewry at Bar-Ilan University.

Unlike in the Diaspora, Israel's concern with intermarriage is not due to fear of assimilation into a majority non-Jewish society.

Rather, it is primarily an issue of societal unity. The emergence of a significant minority of what my colleague Professor Asher Cohen refers to as "Non-Jewish Jews" within Israel, may lead – if it has not already done so – to increased hesitation among Religious-Zionists regarding participation of their children in activities (such as army and university education) that engender social interaction with secular Jews whose lineage is less clear.

The diversity of Jewish religious practice was on display when an eclectic group of 37 male and female rabbis visiting from Northern California shuffled into the Bina Center for Jewish Identity and Hebrew Culture seminary in grimy south Tel Aviv last Thursday.

Some were affiliated with Chabad Hassidut and sported bushy beards and tallit fringes sticking out from their shirts. Others were Reform and Conservative rabbis wearing little or no visible Jewish garb, and at least one female rabbi was wearing a kippa.

Biale also focuses on David Ben-Gurion, who, "like Spinoza," saw the Bible as "primarily a nationalist book," one "that gave a political identity to the ancient nation of Israel, an identity that transcended mere religion."

He shows how Israel's first prime minister fostered "a kind of ‘bibliomania,'" and thereby "played a major role in the elevation of the Bible to the status of national myth" in the new State of Israel.

...Since the 1990s, increasing numbers of young Israelis, he tells us, have been engaging in the study of traditional texts in secular houses of study.

Although this is "a relatively small phenomenon," it is evidence that not everyone is ready to cede the Bible and the rest of Jewish tradition to the rabbis.

Does this mean that Israeli organizations such as the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund, which traditionally served a conduit for international donors, no longer have a place?

As an Israeli I really value these organizations and I want them to remain strong, but I really think they need to reevaluate their roles in the Jewish world and in Israeli life. Perhaps they could become a platform for other areas of involvement that are more specific?

I do, however, think it’s important for them to remain strong and for all of us to be united, maybe even creating a round table for world Jewry to change its ideas and work together to build a common vision for the next generation of Jews and Israel.

A new initiative aimed at uniting philanthropic efforts to improve the treatment of people with disabilities in theJewish community and to raise awareness of their needs was announced Friday by the Jewish Funders Network (JFN), an international umbrella organization for Jewish philanthropy.

The British government’s recent decision to increase university tuition is causing a dramatic drop in Israel gap year program participants from this country, organizers of such programs lamented this week.

Israeli politicians have recruited rap star Shyne to improve Israel’s image, though some have criticized the initiative, saying that the 34-year-old who became an Orthodox Jew while serving time in prison for a shooting incident is not a suitable advocate for the country.

An official dealing with Israel-Diaspora relations speaking anonymously told Anglo File said he couldn’t believe why high-ranking politicians would want to affiliate themselves with Shyne.

“I just can’t understand how Ayalon and Edelstein have their picture taken with a gangsta rapper who sat in jail for trying to shoot people.”

The writer is a Washington lawyer and a research associate at the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, Brandeis University.

Shira Hadasha is a medley, wading in a civilization deluged with history, rising to gasp the air of a radical present. It invites women to leyn and honors them with aliyot but permits only men to lead services.

I conferred with an American rabbi regarding my plan to read Torah. The Mishna discusses women receiving aliyot; how could he condemn the practice?

We have gone to a lot of trouble over the past century to create a place that, finally, would be "just Jewish," where our culture would be the culture of the land, where we wouldn't have to wonder if our kids should be singing Christmas carols.

And here we are, wearing (or not) Santa Claus hats in the Jewish state, trying to work out just what should be our relationship to the other cultures around us.

A woman’s bid to sue her recalcitrant husband for NIS 700,000 in damages after he consistently refused her a get (Jewish divorce) for more than 16 years was upheld this week in a precedent-setting decision by the Tel Aviv District Court.

“This is indeed an important precedent,” commented attorney Susan Weiss, founder of the Center for Women’s Justice (CWJ), which has represented the women since her first attempt to seek damages in Family Court through this appeal hearing in the district court.

“This is the first time a court of appeals has ruled on such a case and its decision – barring a contrary ruling by the Supreme Court – is binding on all family courts in Israel.”

She added, “This is also an important ruling for CWJ, for Israeli women, as well as for Jewish women in the Diaspora.

Judges Esther Covo, Michal Rubinstein and Ofra Czerniak wrote that the woman was take captive by her husband, who set up a prison for her from the moment she agreed to marry him.

"The wife was entitled to a divorce from the moment she sought it, all the more so when she married the appellant at the age of 24, lived with him for only three months, and was not content with him," the judges wrote.

"Today she is close to 40 and continues to suffer from the appellant's cruel behavior towards her… The state of events described is immoral and contradicts the basic law of man's dignity and freedom."

As the Ashkenazi haredi establishment grapples with senior Sephardi adjudicator Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s recent endorsement of the military conversions, a new initiative is reportedly seeking to galvanize the haredi rabbinic leadership in favor of expanding the option of civil unions in Israel.

According to Mishpacha, a widely read haredi weekly, a group of unnamed but prominent rabbis and Halacha adjudicators are this weekly beginning to present their proposal to the haredi rabbinic leadership for its scrutiny and decision.

The Supreme Court strenuously questioned the statistics which the state presented on Sunday to try to prove that it had made great strides in implementing the Tal Law since a previous hearing in June 2007.

“There has been a significant change in the number of people who have enlisted in the army or volunteered for public service,” the state’s representative, Osnat Mandel, head of the High Court Section of the State Attorney’s Office, told the court.

The product of a Religious Zionist upbringing, Stern grew up in Tel Aviv, joined the paratroopers, became the commanding officer of a platoon, and rose through the ranks to become the commander of the IDF officer school, the Chief Education Officer, and, in his last post, the IDF Manpower Chief.

He has written a book in which he tells us just how much better he has always understood things than have many generals, most rabbis, and all politicians.

Demography is the key. Their constituency growing, religious parties have over the years become influential.

It's no wonder then that politics is stronger than Israel's military might, coalitions more powerful than the great national unifier – especially when coalitions, such as that of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, depend heavily on its ultra-orthodox component.

The daughter of Rabbi Menachem Eliezer Moses, chairman of the Haredi ‏(ultra-Orthodox‏) United Torah Judaism faction, is planning to contend for a place on Kadima’s Knesset list and advance a feminist agenda.

Heidi Moses abandoned the ultra-Orthodox world about five years ago, after many years in which she felt it was no longer suitable for her.

Ultra-Orthodox favor religiously observant businesses: 78% of Haredim said they would not patronize a company that operates on Shabbat, according to a survey by the Dahaf Institute for the Haredi newspaper Hamevasser.

An extreme ultra-Orthodox body has established a kashrut department supervising clothing stores in Jerusalem's Mea Shearim and Geula neighborhoods.

Haredi women have begun supervising businesses in the neighborhoods on behalf of the new department, checking whether the clothes sold in the stores meet the requirements of Jewish Law. The department's findings will be published across the neighborhoods.

New and suitable employment opportunities are opening up to Hareidi women, in addition to the traditional education and secretarial fields which were almost their only options in the past.

A payroll management course is concluding these days in the Modi’in Illit branch of the Hareidi Center for Vocational Training and, as the results of the official examination by the Institute of Certified Public Accountants indicate, 90 percent of the Hareidi women who took the course passed the exam.

The ultra-Orthodox "Jewish Taliban" cult is one of the most extreme groups ever established in Israel. Established over six years ago, when haredi women tried to fight immodesty in Israel, the group's members decided to wear a robe covering their bodies from the shoulders down.

This cult now has hundreds of members all over the country. Their motto is clear: Cover up as much as you can in the name of modesty.

Film director Anat Zuria ("Purity", "Sentenced to Marriage") has encountered these "Taliban women" while working on one of her films. "Many of them were newly-religious," she said. "They talked about returning to our modest roots, dressing like our mothers from past generations."

Deputy Education Minister Meir Porush intends to submit his resignation to Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin on Thursday, due to an agreement between the Lithuanian and hassidic parties that make up the United Torah Judaism faction.

According to the worshippers, the collapse of the roof at the site's "Chatzer" hall is indicative of deficient maintenance, which, according to them, goes against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to include the Cave of Patriarchs in his national heritage plan.

Rabbi Israel Meir Gabbai returned to Israel last Tuesday after over a week in the Islamic Republic of Iran, where he visited and prayed at the sites believed to be the burial places of biblical figures such as prophets Daniel and Habakkuk, Daniel’s contemporaries Hanania, Mishael and Azaria, and local Jewish heroes Mordechai and Esther.

Dvora Szerer, spokeswoman for the Transplant Center said transplants suddenly increased by 150 percent in the weeks after the highly emotional moment when Cohen's son announced on national television that his father had been pronounced brain dead "which is to say, he has died."

"Avi Cohen's death came up in every conversation with the donors' families," Szerer said. Awareness was raised and readiness to donate jumped.

Baruch A. Brody is the Leon Jaworski Professor of Biomedical Ethics and director of the Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy at Baylor College of Medicine. Rabbi Shlomo M. Brody, a member of the RCA, teaches at Yeshivat Hakotel in Jerusalem and writes the “Ask the Rabbi” column for The Jerusalem Post. They are father and son.

Does Jewish law allow the donation of organs from brain-dead patients in order to save lives? The recent report by the Rabbinical Council of America’s Vaad Halacha, or committee on Jewish law, suggests that new medical information should cause us to answer “no.”

During a recent conference of the High School Principals' Association, Dr. Zvi Zameret, the head of the Education Ministry's Pedagogical Secretariat, has expressed concern that 40% of last year's national religious high school graduates were not tested on literature.

The extremist right-wing Lehava organization, which has the stated goal of combating Jewish assimilation in Israel, will begin providing special certification to dozens of businesses in the coming weeks that commit to employing only Jews, several activists from the organization said yesterday.

NIF grantee 12 Heshvan: Promoting Tolerance in an Orthodox Context Executive Director Dr. Gadi Gvaryahu said that his organization will consider issuing certificates of merit to businesses if they employ minorities and foreign workers.

He said, “We will remind the Jewish people that the Torah warns us in 36 places to treat the stranger well.”

Itai Granek is 25 years old and the director of the Garin Torani - religious Zionists who try to help underdeveloped communities. Granek's group in Jaffa, which was set up about three years ago, includes about 50 families.

There has been tension with local people who characterize the group's activities as an attempt to put up "a Jewish settlement in Jaffa."